It must be really hard to keep track of the pieces. They need to dress in something to differentiate their roles and teams.

Knight jumps Queen! Bishop jumps Queen! Pawns jump Queen! Gangbang! Come on jump the Queen!

My only explanation for this chaos is that pieces go back to the starting square of any piece of their type when captured, instead of being sent off the board. Thus two black pawns on H7 (why though?), and the presence of two black pawns on the E-file with no other black pawns apparently moved - it looks as though the A pawn and G pawn have been captured and sent back to E7 and H7.
 
Also, I’m honestly not sure what that F-pawn mare thinks she’s doing. Maybe the grass is greener on the other side of the tile boundary.
 
However, Luna and Fancypants still appear to be completely inept at the game. Luna is particularly bad about this, having traded a rook for a knight with no chance for a positional gain or a knockout attack (although if my theory is correct, this doesn’t matter because the pieces just get sent home anyway).
 
If this is a developed sport among the nobility, to where they actually have a dedicated space and players to play living chess, they ought to be playing more intelligently and have better development of their pawns and pieces - unless the entire point is to mess around with a living chessboard as an excuse to socialise and socially posture.
 
Finally, one of those black H-pawn ponies is actually a small dromedary!

I@Typewriterpony  
It was also made with a Smurf comic.

@P3FOYFN
 
… That symbol. What is about it? The three primary characters from the Blair Witch Project (Also mentioned here) were all smokers if I remember that right.

Y’know, they actually have chess matches like this using cosplayers at anime/nerd conventions as the pieces. One memorible one was when somebody took out a Dr. Eggman cosplayer, the Sonic cosplayer took off his mustache, (just like the intro of the old AoStH show) prompting him to run away screaming hilarious. (Can’t find the video of that sorry.)

 

 
 
Simpsons did it.

@Hpar  
There’s also the fact that the moves they order are impossible - if we can see a1, then Ra1xa6 is impossible, because of the piece on a2. If we cannot see a1, then Ra8xa6 is impossible, because there is no piece on a8.

It’s Lego Chess all over again.

@rogerSnow  
Or the Lung Association.
 

@Hpar  
a1 is the lower left corner of the chessboard (not seen here), and a8 is the upper left corner (the far corner in the picture). The blue unicorn standing next to the red flower is standing on a6.
 
So, yeah, there’s a little confusion here. Luna is playing White (because she’s moving the rook at a1) and Fancy Pants is playing Black (because he’s moving the rook at a8). It appears that the blue unicorn is Fancy Pants’ rook that supposedly just captured Luna’s. However, Luna’s rook could not have captured Fancy Pant’s knight at a6, because both of his knights are still in their starting locations (b8 and g8) on the board.
 
And I have no idea what the two pawns (one going from g2-g3 and the other leaving f7) are doing, since they’re clearly not following orders.

@621Chopsuey  
Twilight’s cutie mark in the .mov series was the Blair Witch stick man figure. The only thing I see resembling that here looks more like a telephone pole.

 
MAKE IT HAPPEN

@Hpar  
They don’t have Kings and Queens, but Princes and Princesses, because all Kings and Queens are inherantly EVIL in Equestria.

As a chess maniac, seeing this a little bit on detail, I’m seeing some flaws in this image.
 
*But first, I’m going to congratulate the artist for drawing well the board in here. Not only it’s 8x8 (common knowledge, but seen many artists who failed in this part), but also it’s oriented well (a white space MUST be in the lower right of each player, a common mistake by many people).
 
*However, Luna and Fancy Pants are playing with Rooks. In the picture above, there’s NO WAY the Rook could get out of its initial position, simply because the other pieces are in the way. (We aren’t seeing the whole board, so there are some pieces that aren’t showing in the lower left. However, we have a clear view of the upper right side, and one Rook is missing, but there’s no way it could be out of the way in that position).
 
*Also, there are two pawns in the same square, but that could be argued that it’s just a mistake of the pony not being in place.
 
*And there’s a missing pawn for the lower left side, but that could also be argued that it’s behind the dialogue balloon.
 
So they didn’t researched well the chess game, or this is another type of chess that can be played in equestria.

@DutchGentleman
 
…Thank you so much for saying that.

@Flanagan  
Pawn threatens Bishop! (Shakes hoof at him!)

Im so using this scene for my fic

“All right, posh underling! I’m invoking the princess’s privilege!”

 
“Buck that bitch…”

That mare in the front … is that Twilight’s cutie mark in the PONY.MOV series?

@Flanagan  
Awwwww, boooo.  

@Poptard  
I’d accept THIS as a ship over Luna and Sombra any day.